According to Bobby, the dance craze existed long before Motown 25 and he even passed his moonwalk instructor’s lesson down to the King of Pop before it became his signature move.

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“Actually, I was the one that taught Michael how to do it,” he said when asked about the moonwalk’s origins. Bobby explained how it all went down, recollecting that him and his New Edition clique received an invite to the Thriller icon’s home. They all found themselves dancing in “this big room with mirrors,” in which MJ spotted Bobby’s distinctive dance move.

“We was poppin,’ he was watchin’ us pop,” he said. “He saw me do the moonwalk. And he [asked], ‘What is that?’ And I did it again. He just watched it, and he just started doin’ it.”